Mr.Deathbulge's illustrated FML

Hello everyone! How was your week? So-so? Cool? Great? Let's hope it was as amazing as today's artist. Last week we received Jeff Mumm, who inspired us with his unique journey; today, it's all about Dan Martin. His web comic Deathbulge is one of our favorites. Absurd, dark humor; simple art style, but oh-so-very expressive; we'd like to think he's a worthy successor of Cyanide & Happiness. Let's check his interview out, you'll see for yourself!

-What is your name, surname, as well as your nickname on the world wide web?
-My real name is Dan Martin. Though a lot of people don't know that and call me things like Mr. Deathbulge, which is FINE BY ME. I love it. I picked the name Deathbulge because the comic was originally a story about a death metal band, and I just wanted to think up a metal band name that made me giggle, and that was the only one that managed to. Check out Mr. Standards over here.

-How old are you?
-I am 25.

-Where do you live?
-I live in Surrey, UK. The town I live in is actually German for MURDERING. Which is pretty cool/foreshadowing.

-What do you do for a living?
-My job is the webcomics at the moment. I quit my little retail gig back in August 2013 to pursue the dream and make a living out of drawing comics. It's a tall order and I'm still a long ways off yet, but hopefully the merchandise I plan on selling in the near future will help. Failing that I'll most likely have to get a part-time job to help me out a bit.

-What's your journey?
-I don't really know! But as long as I'm pursuing creative urges, always challenging myself and making people laugh, it's all good. It would be great to branch out with Deathbulge at some point, break into animation or something. In fact I really REALLY want to make some sort of Deathbulge RPG game at some point. It's ambitious, but I'm determined to get one done before I snuff it.

-What are your inspirations?
-The readers mostly. Knowing that there's so many people checking out my comics. It's the greatest motivator ever to keep doing my thing no matter what. Especially when they take the time to send me mail or Facebook/Twitter messages saying how much they like the comics, ah man. I love that Deathbulge has gone down so well with people. I really do. I LOVE YOU ALL THERE I SAID IT.

-I think they love you back (including me) Do you read web comics? If so, which ones?
-Before Deathbulge (or pre-bulge as I like to call it) it was all about Perry Bible Fellowship, Nedroid and Cyanide & Happiness. I pretty much read NOTHING outside of those three. But once I started making my own comics, before I knew it I was super involved with the community and there's all sorts of comics I check out on the regular. Mercworks, Up and Out and Whomp! to name a few, and maybe Pandyland if he updated more often >: (.

-What else can you tell us about Deathbulge?
-There's not much to say about the site other than that I update it with comics every Monday and Friday. Though I do like to throw in a few surprises to keep things fun, every once in a while you'll see an animated comic, or a comic with some dodgy experimental shading techniques. As for why I started webcomics, it's strange. Deathbulge just felt like something I had to do. I felt that I could make a decent webcomic series if I just went for it. So I did. But to actually reach the level of popularity that I have and in such a short space of time. Bloody fantastic.

-How do you work?
-I like to be prepared. I've never liked leaving things till the last minute. I'm always striving to work up a backlog of comics as much as possible, so the comics are done and ready to post days/weeks before they are due. Less stressful that way! It's especially handy for when I get an idea for a comic that is particularly lengthy, I have time on my side so I can afford to be super fussy with the details and get it done properly, rather than rush it and not do the joke justice.

-Why did you choose this FML story?
-It just sounded like the most fun to draw in terms of visuals. It painted quite the picture! I threw in a fish for good measure. Sega Bass Fishing representin'.

If you want to be the next published artist, send an email to alice [at] fmylife.com including a link to your website/blog/DeviantArt. But DON'T send your illustration right away! You need first to get in touch with me, and I'll tell you what you have to do!

Sophie Marie's illustrated FML

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